Sustainable Innovation

In order to better understand customer requirements and to encourage firms to generate Many Alternative Sustainable Solutions (MASS) in developing sustainable innovations, Explore Your Customore was created; a toolbox with a set of inspirational cards with proven innovation methodologies.

Through Portfolio Sustainability Assessments (PSAs) companies are able to collect insights into the sustainability performance of existing product portfolios. But how can companies capture the full value from these results? In general, PSAs determine hotspots of products that provide the most potential to capture additional value through improved decisions on key business processes. Perhaps surprisingly, the powerful PSA tool is not widely applied yet in the global business environment.

Earlier this summer, Finch & Beak’s team in the Netherlands moved into a new office, located in a 1930s water tower in the Belcrum area of Breda. While the Dutch have a complex history with water, the ongoing drought across Europe is putting water scarcity on the collective agenda, even in areas where it was thought to be abundant.

A first of its kind circular project was announced in June 2018, originating from the research from an engineer and executive MBA graduate at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland (EPFL). The project aims to help Vale, the world’s largest iron-ore mining company, transform residue into resource. It does that by extracting untapped value from its mine tailings by transforming it into new products. Concurrently, sand consumption around the world is increasing faster than supplies are naturally able to replenish, making it one of the most coveted resources behind fresh water. This forms a great opportunity for Vale as its mine tailings high in quartz can be used in many sand-based products. In a conversation with Finch & Beak, project initiator and leader Emile Scheepers explains how thinking differently about the product life cycle allowed him to uncover this new opportunity.

In response to the global threat imposed by resource scarcity and climate change, circular economy is highly regarded as a way to secure a sustainable future and to enable businesses and society to thrive.

Instead of innovating in isolation, multinationals are opening their doors and partner with startups to design solutions for their most pressing challenges. Coca-Cola, Google and Disney are only a few of the companies that have captured value of initiating these corporate accelerators. These accelerators increasingly focus on sustainability issues. One of the latest companies entering the stage is Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev). The global beer company has announced its 100+ Accelerator, aiming to address global challenges in line with the group’s 2025 Sustainability Goals.

This year, Bloomberg is bringing its Sustainable Business Summit to Amsterdam for the first time on June 20-21, 2018. Don't miss the opportunity to meet and learn from a diverse group of sustainability experts!

The last years have seen tremendous change within the apparel industry with new sustainable innovations gaining traction. With a greater emphasis on circularity, transparency and supply chain efficiencies coming from fashion and apparel brands, the next 12 months looks set to be another step-change year for the industry. Be part of this change by attending the Innovation Forum's conference on sustainability in the apparel industry on the 24th-25th April 2018, in Amsterdam.

More than 40 years since the introduction of the universal recycling symbol, the worldwide usage of plastic has skyrocketed causing unprecedented environmental impacts on the planet. However since the start of 2018, plastic waste has been very high on the agenda. This was not only seen in the talks in Davos, but also through the increasing number of commitments made by companies such as Lego, Coca-Cola, Evian and Adidas to name a few, to reduce, reuse, recycle and recover the plastic in their supply chain.

As companies collect more and more non-financial data, it's worth exploring what else can be done with the results of this huge effort. Novozymes shows that companies can turn this burden into a business opportunity by capturing the value that is harnessed in the abundance of data. Using big data techniques, peer comparisons are made and the non-financial data is harvested and combined with market information resulting in clear prospects.